Comparing Animal Philosophies

Includes animal rights but has broader scope, e.g. overlaps with
environmental ethics and utilitarianism.

Asks how we should treat animals and provides a number of approaches.

Does not offer any particular moral viewpoint about animals. Is a
doctrine about how we should treat animals.

Tries to resolve moral animal-human issues using a number of schemes.

Applies to all animals.

Animal Rights

Concentrates only on rights, a sub-set of animal ethics.

Asserts that using animals for human gain is morally wrong.

Is a doctrine about how we should treat animals.

Asserts that we have a duty to give animals rights and we should respect
those rights.

Applies to all animals.

Concentrates on sentient animals.

Animal Rights vs Animal Welfare

Animal rights overlaps with animal welfare and conservation. But although
all three share many similarities there are important differences that set
them apart from each other and make them conflicting philosophies.

The Rights Position

Morality - Using animals is morally wrong.

Benefits - We should not use animals to benefit ourselves.

Interests - We should not invariably overrule the interests of
the animals with human interests.

Pain - We should not inflict pain or death on animals.

Humane Treatment - We should always treat animals humanely and
eliminate the human made causes of animal suffering.

The Animal Welfare Position

Morality - Using animals is morally right.

Benefits - We can use animals to benefit ourselves.

Interests - Our interests are always more important than the
interests of animals.

Pain - We should not cause animals 'unnecessary' pain or death.

Humane Treatment - We should treat animals as humanely as
convenient to us.

Animal rightists often disparage of animal welfare because the two
philosophies are worlds apart in important respects. As the radical animal
rights academic and activist Stephen Best (see Chapter 6) says, "Animal
'welfare' laws do little but regulate the details of exploitation." (Best,
Steven & Nocella, Anthony J (eds). Terrorist or Freedom Fighter?,
Lantern Books: New York. 2002:12)

Another important difference between animal rights and animal welfare is
that one is subjective and the other is objective. We cannot measure animal
rights impartially or scientifically. It is a concept and a personal moral
choice. It resembles the conviction of the German philosopher Immanuel Kant
(1724 - 1804) that we should not harm humans even in the interests of the
majority. Animal rights takes Kant's view (a Duty Ethics concept, see
Chapter 2: Animal Ethics, Table 1) a step further and applies it to animals.
Animal welfare, on the other hand, has the advantage that we can measure it
objectively and manipulate it scientifically. For instance, to find which
kind of bedding chickens prefer, we can count the number of chickens who
seek to live on a straw floor or a wire mesh floor. Then we might provide
the chickens with their choice, economic and other constraints permitting.
Morally, we can see animal welfare as part of Consequence Ethics
conceptually underpinned by Utilitarianism.

Animal welfare has a variation called new welfarism, in outlook between
animal welfare and animal rights. Like animal rightists, new welfarists
support abolishing the causes of suffering; however, new welfarists argue
that it will take a long time to achieve this and meanwhile we must do all
we can to support the welfare of animals to lessen their suffering. Thus,
for instance, new welfarists want to phase out fur farms and animal
experiments but in the short-term they try to improve conditions for these
animals. Critics of new welfarism say this route supports animal
exploitation and therefore is a useless philosophy and the ultimate act of
betrayal for animals. New welfarists counter by claiming that their outlook
is more achievable, and therefore is of more immediate benefit to exploited
animals, than the perhaps impossible goals of animal rights, such as
demanding complete closure of anti-animal industries and changing the deep
seated habits of billions of people.

Animal Rights vs Conservation

Animal rights and nature conservation both became popular among the
public in the late 1970's. Both standpoints oppose human-centredness and
believe that wild animals have intrinsic value (although this is not an
attitude of all conservationists). Animal rightists and nature
conservationists both support conserving nature, although for different
reasons. Conservationists support nature for the sake of greater
conservation whereas animal rightists support nature for the sake of the
animals who live in it. The differences between both outlooks, however, are
deep.

Animal Rights

Focuses on the individual animals as well as on animals in
general.

Refers usually to sentient animals and not to plants or the
physical environment.

Is concerned with animals in areas of human activity (e.g.,
agriculture, laboratories, fur trade and circuses).

Focuses on levels above the individual (populations, species,
ecosystems and the biosphere) except when just a few individuals are
the only survivors of their population or species.

Encompasses all creatures (plants, etc.) and includes the
physical part of nature (e.g., air and water).

Is not usually concerned with animals in these areas of human
activity unless they intrude on conservation matters, such as when
wild animals are taken from endangered populations.

Pain and death to conservationists are a part of life that
individuals must endure, and conservationists would prefer
individuals to suffer so long as their populations or species
survive.

Deep Ecology

There is another philosophy that has an important bearing on our behavior
to animals. It contrasts with animal rights and helps to see it in
perspective. Deep Ecology is concerned with fundamental philosophical,
practical and personal questions about the ways humans relate to their
environment. It relates to animals because of course animals live in nature
and are part of our environment. Deep Ecology opposes the exploitation and
destruction of the natural world by materialism and consumerism. It says we
should minimize our impact on the world and it appeals for a change in the
way we think about the world. Deep Ecology predicts that if we do not shift
our basic values and customs we will destroy the diversity and beauty of the
world's life and its ability to support humanity.

The ideas of Deep Ecology came about against the background of the
nascent Environmentalism of the 1960's. Deep Ecology is primarily associated
with Norwegian philosopher Arne Naess. The Deep in Deep Ecology refers to a
fundamental or wise questioning of attitudes to nature. Deep Ecology
questions the root causes of the degeneration of the variety and richness of
the world. It calls for a more enlightened approach for humanity to live
within the bounds of Nature rather than to depend on technological fixes as
remedies for our exploitation / destruction of nature.

Naess coined the term Deep Ecology in 1973 in contrast to shallow
ecology, a lesser form of environmentalism and typical of present society.
The nature of shallow ecology has a utilitarian and anthropocentric
attitude, based on materialism and consumerism. Shallow ecology focuses on
using the world's natural resources for unlimited human growth and comes up
with technological solutions to offset environmental problems thus made. For
example, shallow ecology promotes recycling of commercial and industrial
waste instead of preventing the generation of waste in the first place.
Again, shallow ecology supports placing ever increasing demands on the land
to produce more food instead of improving human birth control to reduce
human numbers.

The Eight Tenets of Deep Ecology

Eight tenets, composed by Naess and colleagues, form the basis of Deep
Ecology thought. These points are intended to be agreeable to people from
any philosophical, political or religious background. Paraphrased the eight
tenets are:

All creatures on Earth have intrinsic value.

The whole diversity of living beings, simple as well as complex,
contribute to life's richness.

The eight tenets of Deep Ecology contrast with shallow ecology, which
could be characterized as:

All creatures on Earth have value only for their usefulness to
humans.

Complex creatures (i.e. humans) are more important than simpler
ones.

Humans should use all resources for their material and economic
advantage.

The human population can increase without restraint.

Technological progress will solve all problems.

Materialism and consumerism should govern human society.

The standard of living should keep rising.

Leave environmental problems for the experts to solve.

The philosophy of Deep Ecology is supported by some sections of political
parties and is used as a philosophical basis for change by environmental
activists opposing the human destruction of nature. As a guide for personal
growth, Deep Ecology invites each individual to intermesh with and identify
with all living creatures. But we are not just saving other species and
ecosystems, we are really saving ourselves, because nature is the part of us
extending beyond our skin. Deep Ecology says that humans are not isolated
objects but are part of the whole.

A criticism of Deep Ecology from the animal rights viewpoint is that it
maintains we can use animals to satisfy our basic needs (Tenet 3). "Deep"
animal rights philosophy forbids the use of animals. We would use up a vast
number of animals if all the billions of humans put to use an animal just
occasionally. Another problem with Deep Ecology is that it relies on the
idea of intrinsic value (Tenet 1). If you do not believe in intrinsic value,
however, you could still support Deep Ecology and pursue animal liberation
(as opposed to rights) by adopting a utilitarian philosophy.

Conclusion

Can you be an exclusive animal rightist, welfarist, conservationist or
deep ecologist? Actually, being exclusively one or the other may be the most
difficult course. Another approach is to see these philosophies, not as
necessarily mutually exclusive, but as reinforcing one another. We can
surely be benignly flexible and adopt the best ideas and activities from
each of them depending on the particular circumstances we encounter.
Certainly, knowledge about each of them and their antitheses helps us
understand the outlook of other people.

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